


Closer in the Drift

by ilostmyshoe



Category: Pacific Rim (2013)
Genre: Aromantic, Asexual Awareness Week, Asexual Character, Asexuality, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-10-27
Updated: 2013-10-27
Packaged: 2017-12-30 16:44:36
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 469
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1021021
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ilostmyshoe/pseuds/ilostmyshoe
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>For Asexual Awareness Week for the prompts "POC aces" and "Aromantic ace people." </p><p>"Pilots who weren’t romantic partners might have sex with other people, but they rarely cultivated ongoing relationships, and when they did they never lasted long. Jaeger pilots who were involved with each other all agreed that their time in the drift was far more intimate than sex could ever be.</p><p>Mako had figured all of this out by the time she was ten."</p>
            </blockquote>





	Closer in the Drift

For some people the most important people in their life are family members. For other people their priority is romantic partners or close, long-term friends. For Jaeger pilots it was always, _always_ their partner in the drift. Pilots who weren’t romantic partners might have sex with other people, but they rarely cultivated ongoing relationships, and when they did they never lasted long. Jaeger pilots who were involved with each other all agreed that their time in the drift was far more intimate than sex could ever be.

Mako had figured all of this out by the time she was ten. She occasionally worried about coming second to Stacker’s co-pilot, but decided that was different since they didn’t actually pilot together anymore. Still, she wondered what their relationship had been like. She never saw Stacker get close to anyone else (besides herself), but she didn’t want to make assumptions, so one day, after gathering her courage and carefully rehearsing her words, she came right out and asked him.

She learned that they were close, platonic friends. More, she learned that Stacker had never been sexually involved with anyone. Growing up he had never understood the appeal, and when others had pressured him to try a relationship he had just buried himself deeper in his work and his studies. Occasionally he had gotten lonely as more and more of his peers had paired off into romantic relationships, but whenever he had considered pursuing a sexual relationship of his own the idea had felt so wrong that he had simply pushed the loneliness aside and focused on more practical  concerns.

Then, when he had first heard about the drift he had been intrigued. Here was a form of intimacy that bypassed all of the physical awkwardness and messiness inherent in sexual intimacy. He had campaigned to get himself assigned to the early trials and had never regretted it. In his fellow Jaeger pilots he had found the companionship he had been lacking, and he had never again seriously considered seeking sexual intimacy to supplement it.

Mako had listened to all of this intently, all the more focused because Stacker was rarely willing to share so openly about his past. For years afterwards she had assumed that her life would follow roughly the same path: intense study rewarded by meaningful work and hopefully, some day, the thrill, intimacy, and power of the drift. When the Jaeger program began to lose funding she worried that she would be denied just as she was finally ready to achieve her goal. When she met Raleigh Becket, she peered out from under her umbrella and wondered whether her reaction to him was a side effect of her growing desperation or a sign that, unlike Stacker, she might want to experience intimacy outside of the drift as well.


End file.
